Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Steve Miller" <smille10 AT sbcglobal.net>]

Most people think that "yehi or vayehi or" means that God spoke light into
existence in that verse. I don't think it has to mean that. 

The phrase "haya <noun>" without a predicate seems to be rare. 

An example is the 6 repetitions in Gen 1 of the phrase "vayehi erev vayehi
bokar", "and it became evening, and it became morning". It doesn't mean that
evening and morning never existed before and came into existence 6 times.

"Light be made" is about as good a translation of Gen 1:3 as "and evening
was made, and morning was made" is of 1:5b, 8b, and so forth for each of the
6 days.

Sincerely,
-Steve Miller
www.voiceInWilderness.info
The Lord send your help from the sanctuary,
out of Zion support thee,
remember all your offerings,
and consume your burnt offering. Selah (Psalm 20:2-3)

> -----Original Message-----
> From: K Randolph
> 
> James:
> My understanding of the verb היה is that it has much the meaning of
> “become”. So verse three most literally could be translated as “And God
> said, “Light, become!” and light became.” Awful English, but it gets the
> idea across.
> 
> How best to render this idea into English is a translation question, not
> necessarily Hebrew.
> 
> What I remember from history is that Wycliffe translated from the Vulgate,
> while Tyndale directly from Hebrew.
> 
> Karl W. Randolph.